NATALIE HALE speaks to multi-award winning stand-up and international film star Omid Djalili as he goes back on the road for the first time in over three years

When I spoke to comic and actor Omid Djalili over Christmas, it was a very different Omid to the one I met up with three years ago.

He’s much more restrained and reflective than the comic whose schtick was based on being Iranian and who was famous for his humorous, self-deprecating bellydancing.

“I struggle with being ‘The Funny Guy’,” Omid reveals. “I don’t like that label at all.

“As you grow as an artist, you become more serious and being funny is part of it – not all of it.

“I actually get offended when people shout out ‘Hey! Bellydance Guy!’ I have to come to terms with that.

“That’s why this tour is so important to me – to show the world who I am now.”

Omid is talking about his new show Tour Of Duty, which follows a three-year hiatus from stand-up.

But the star has not been idle in the intervening years. He has established a highly successful career as an actor, starring as Fagin in West-End smash-hit Oliver!, earning praise for his award-winning role as Mahmud Nasir in David Baddiel’s controversial comedy The Infidel, and appearing alongside a wealth of international talent in the blockbusting Sex And The City 2 and Brit-hit Mr Nice.

Despite such high profile acting work, Omid recently decided that now was the right time to flex his stand-up muscles and get back on the road with a new comedy show.

“I feel like I have evolved a great deal in a direction that is good for me and that I want to go in, and I wanted to bring that to my stand-up,” he explains.

“I used to talk a lot about being an Iranian, but not so much anymore. I have freed myself from those shackles, which means I can talk about me and my own exclusive experiences.

“I came to the realisation that I can be funny without worrying about being Iranian. I proved that to myself and to others by doing lots of different projects.”

In Tour Of Duty, Omid notes the diversity of modern Britain, tackles world events and explores his personal relationship with the stories behind the headlines.

“The whole show is based around a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt that says, ‘Great minds talk about ideas, average minds talk about events, and small minds only talk about other people’.

“In stand-up, you do all those things – you talk about other people, you make sense of events and you elevate lofty ideas. So that’s the framework,” he explains.

“Within that, the show takes in all the major world events like the Arab Spring, the death of Bin Laden, the death of Gadaffi, the riots, the whole debacle at The News of The World... but it also takes a more personal look at things that affect me.

“It’s a mixture of subjects but at the core it’s a funny, silly show and people have responded to it very well.

“Reviews have been more mixed,” he sighs. “Some reviewers just don’t get it.

“A lot of reviewers are too thick to understand it. It’s too subtle for them – they like to be hit over the head by jokes.”

It’s not just reviewers who have been commenting on Omid’s comedy style – he has found that the public aren’t afraid to pull their punches online, although their responses are more likely to raise a smile from the comic.

“I’m a big Twitter fan. It makes me laugh,” he says.

“For example, I’d say over 90 per cent of tweets about my appearance at The Royal Variety Show recently were lovely. Really positive.

“But one particular person tweeted that I was the worst act on the Variety Show. Ever.

“His next tweet read ‘Barry Manilow’s on... yeah!’ so that made me feel better!

“Twitter is a strange beast. I found out about the death of Osama Bin Laden from the Everton right back Phil Neville! Where else but on Twitter?”

Omid says he is thrilled to have been given such diverse work opportunities and is revelling in his eclectic career.

He is also happier now that he has accepted that you can’t please all of the people all of the time...

“Reaction to me changes from person to person, depending on whether they’ve seen me in a musical, a film, a TV show or an advert.

“They’re all high-profile things, and some of it the audience love and some of it isn’t everybody’s cup of tea.

“For example, I get a lot of positive comments about the Moneysupermarket.com ad from people who find it hilarious; others say it’s a sell-out.

Omid tells me that Mr Nice, co-starring Rhys Ifans, was a highlight for him: “It was such a fun film to do, and I was so happy that I could wear a wig!

“When we were working on The Infidel I went to a screening of Mr Nice and I had to come back and tell the guys that although Mr Nice wasn’t a comedy as such, it was one of the funniest films I had seen.

“The Infidel, which was a comedy, was nowhere near as funny at that point. We had to put much more comedy back in. So Mr Nice was instrumental in ‘funnying up’ The Infidel!

“And Oliver! was a great experience. Before that, I never liked musicals. Couldn’t stand them. Of course, I’m a lovey now and I really want to play Fiddler on The Roof!

“But for the moment, I’m concentrating on stand-up. Being a stand-up comedian is part of me and I don’t want to neglect it. It feels good to be back.”

Omid Djaili plays Colston Hall on Sunday, January 29, at 8pm. Tickets cost £19. Tel 0117 922 3686